Speaking as a total ignoramus on UI design, I would also suggest reading everything and anything by Edward Tufte (the Visual Display of Quantitative Information might be a good start). It won't give you any special insights into UI, but it should help to reinforce the point that making a good UI isn't about dumbing things down (a common geek misconception), but having a very strong sense of respect for the user. Good luck! (And the Norman book that everyone recommends is also a great read)
Take scientific research, for example. A large part of a scientist's life is publishing his work, communicating his results. Would you complain that he was dumbing down his articles just because he worked extra hard to make them easy to read? No, you'd applaud him for conveying difficult concepts as effectively as possible. A scientific article should let the reader focus on the science, and not wade through poor grammar, ambiguous sentences, and various other sources of unreadability.
Similarly, a GUI should let the user focus on what he wants to do without having to wade through poor gramamr, unclear choices, and various other sources of unusability.
I am surprised nobody has brought up literate programming yet. Completely flips over the relationship between code and comments. You are principally writing a document for human consumption. One in a while, you also toss in a little fragment of code for the computer's benefit.
Re:Newsweek: The Cooling World - April 28, 1975
on
BBC on Global Dimming
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· Score: 1
The realclimate blog (by real climate scientists, they say) has an article debunking this "we thought that there would be global cooling in the 70s" idea. Basic idea seems to be pop media doing their thing then, and now, it's just a case of pop media hysteria, but a general scientific consensus that there really is a problem.
I think I like the OS X approach better; it is just so much simpler. The application is self-contained in a directory with an.app extension and a special structure. The OS recognises the structure and knows what to do when you double-click the icon. That's all.
Installation means dragging the icon (mv'ing the directory) to your hard drive. Want different versions? Want to uninstall? Just get rid of the directory. No problem, just rename the old version.
Drag and drop isn't the point. The point here is that there is conceptual simplicity. No dumbing things down for the "average joe" because there is no need to. Less chance of anything going around that you'd need to find a Linux-savvy user to fix.
We should strive not to dumb things down, but to make things inherently easy to use!
Agree with parent: this kind of packaging system makes Macs very pleasant to deal with. This doesn't solve all our problems, but it is something we should use for apps (openoffice, etc).
In case anyone is arguing that this is simply useless fluff (which it might turn out to be, but for now, give it a fair shake), keep in mind how much your perspective might change if you actually had ENORMOUS number of files on your computer, let's say a couple of decades, each year massive in its own, and every so soften you do want to find that report Carl wrote somewhere back there in the 80s.
Sorry for the preaching, but please try changing your perspective when thinking about this.
Yes interesting! I've always been annoyed by how a file couldn't be in two places at the same time. I guess you could always use links and symlinks but that's just not as easy.
And don't complain about me wanting things to be easy. I'm mostly willing to learn how to use a good tool, but at some point, there needs to be some day to day whiziness, the technology needs to enable you at some point rather than holding you back. Ease isn't appealing for laziness's sake; ease is appealing because of how much bigger you find yourself thinking.
Incidentally, why is it not possible to hardlink a directory?
What we really need is some universally acceptable method to store digital data that isn't likely to decay or fall out of favor in the next ten years. That, I'm afraid, is a difficult proposition.
XML, especially stuff like the Text Encoding Initiative (TEI) and the new MPEG-7 format seem like they would be a good partial response.
Theyre building a browser for programmers, not for end user
Am i misreading this?
Wasn't a browser for programmers (and people interested in testing) the whole POINT of the mozilla project? Keep on using Netscape K-Meleon Chimera Galeon Skipstone Konq, then; you'd still be helping the cause of making people write for standards and not for product X.
heh... funny... but i think the thing that was interesting about the article was that people who did lots of thumby things (mobile phones, games) also started using their thumbs for things that people normally use their index fingers for... no wait, maybe i'm misreading the article.
okay, catch breath... what WOULD make the article interesting is if these people were actually usinsg their thumbs in OTHER non-button-pushy activities that people normally use their fingers for.
So... (NLP stuff aside) is this why secretaries will never become obsolete no matter how advanced technology gets? (this isn't entirely true, i guess, but then you step into AI land which isn't what i'm talking about)
If you're also wanting to do something besides more of the same, you might also be interested in the WMX or WM2 window managers at (http://www.all-day-breakfast.com/wmx/ and
http://www.all-day-breakfast.com/wm2), and also the Lyx document processor (http://www.lyx.org), which has absolutely nothing to do with your request. Be careful, WMX is MUCH nicer when you edit the header files and strip out stuff like pixmap, and "New"
Anyone find that "wife" bit at the end at least moderately amusing? It was as if twingalaxies was trying to slip in a "really, you're not losers!" (no offense directed at the man who accomplished this feat of course)
Know if these things can handle hell-grasses like St. Augustine? Would be great if could use this in sunny Florida where lawnmowing in the summer and the fumes absolutely sucks. Not inhaling the stuff and having my mouth taste funny for the next hour would rock.
Re:GM food is not a good idea yet
on
Golden Rice
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· Score: 1
Erm, right, but we're talking a WHOLE different set of scale here. Not that i don't approve of GM foods, but there really are serious risks involved. I dunno, whassa good analogy? rm, vs rm -R?
okay, i feel stupid posting this (enter the obvious reply, "that's because you are") but i've always sorta felt that of all the diseases in the world, the common cold should be one of those that we really just shouldn't bother to cure For adults at least, it's just a nuiscance, a small suffering. Seems like something people in the cushy part of the world should learn to endure, some amount of minor suffering.
Curing the cold is one more step towards us growing soft and useless. Of course, there are plenty of good reasons for doing this (such as learning about curing stuff in general), but it's just a feeling.
Moral relativism is a weak way of compensating for a lack of information, but for a lot of people, it might just be the best way to go.
Fine, DON'T BE a moral relativist, say that there is a definite RIGHT and WRONG, but if you want to do that, make sure you have enough information. Of course, you can never really do that, but you can at least try.
That means live in China or X years, or at least study it at University with some rigour. Once you really know what you're talking about (mile in man's shoes, etc), then you have all the right in the world to condemn. Personally, i don't think CNN, a visit or two to China, or reports from Harry Wu are sufficient.
Otherwise, moral relativism, though it be weak, is the best you've got.
(only a first stab, please pick apart as neccesary)
I would like to make the humble proposal that people don't rail on The Evil Human Rights Thrashing Oppressors of China unless they ACTUALLY LIVED THERE for a significant amount of time.
Having touristed through or spent a a week, a month, is not enough. If you are a Chinese citizen, or you have lived in China for approximately three or more years, then fine, go ahead.
Otherwise, how much of what you see on CNN et. al do you really trust? Even journalists are susceptible to the danger of overreacting and seeing things through our cultural filters and expectations.
I'm not trying to defend the Chinese Govt. either. They have their problems, but so do we. All i'm begging for is comments from people who genuinely understand the situation. And no, i'm not one of them, which is why i'm sitting my ass as much on this fence as i can.
Tone the hysteria down. More Linux users is overall a GT, right?
Yes, to be able to "watch TV, surf the web, teleconference" is nice, and yes, taking a stance against colour can "set [us] up to be left behind,".
However, developing colour should not come at a sacrifice in further refining basic PDA features: affordability, portability, simplicity, display clarity.
Not that Palm's aren't wonderful as they are, but it'd be more interesting to see them perfect the core bits . Haven't seen one in a while, so maybe they have.
Who knows though, maybe a colour (as a means of encoding info) will keep me better organised. I'm just waiting my middle-class butt can easily afford one.
If this were inevitable, maybe it would be a good idea, as soon as we get the ability, to sample and record genetic information for a bunch of randomly chosen people, imperfections and all.
If in the further distant future, our children realise the mistake (if the were) made via genetic engineering, they could at least attempt to restore some the lost diversity?
If you do decide to switch, but want both layouts, i would recommend popping the caps off and writing the dvorak letters on the FRONT of the keys so you don't wear them out as quickly. It's also unobstrusive for the qwertietes that borrow your computer. Use whatever layout-switching advice you find to go with it.
I use "aaa" (as in what the bloody hell?) to switch to qwerty, and "mmm" (as in mmm... forbiden donut) to switch to dvorak
Yes, coding can be a pain, but quickly got used to it, sucked it up for the benefit of writing emails,/. posts, philosophy or english papers, and so forth. May not be faster, but it certainly FEELS more comfortable, more rhythmic, and more error-free. It also caused my non-typist friend to more easily learn how to type.
Freedom on information, yeah, i understand why that's so important. But might note that China!=US, different circumstances and all. We see this as a tyrannical act of suppresion, but only from the comforts of our nice cozy, wealthy, stable lifestyle.
China will get there when it gets there, by its own means... hopefully
Slashdot Mirror
Speaking as a total ignoramus on UI design, I would also suggest reading everything and anything by Edward Tufte (the Visual Display of Quantitative Information might be a good start). It won't give you any special insights into UI, but it should help to reinforce the point that making a good UI isn't about dumbing things down (a common geek misconception), but having a very strong sense of respect for the user. Good luck! (And the Norman book that everyone recommends is also a great read)
Think of it as a question of clarity.
Take scientific research, for example. A large part of a scientist's life is publishing his work, communicating his results. Would you complain that he was dumbing down his articles just because he worked extra hard to make them easy to read? No, you'd applaud him for conveying difficult concepts as effectively as possible. A scientific article should let the reader focus on the science, and not wade through poor grammar, ambiguous sentences, and various other sources of unreadability.
Similarly, a GUI should let the user focus on what he wants to do without having to wade through poor gramamr, unclear choices, and various other sources of unusability.
I am surprised nobody has brought up literate programming yet. Completely flips over the relationship between code and comments. You are principally writing a document for human consumption. One in a while, you also toss in a little fragment of code for the computer's benefit.
The realclimate blog (by real climate scientists, they say) has an article debunking this "we thought that there would be global cooling in the 70s" idea. Basic idea seems to be pop media doing their thing then, and now, it's just a case of pop media hysteria, but a general scientific consensus that there really is a problem.
I think I like the OS X approach better; it is just so much simpler. The application is self-contained in a directory with an .app extension and a special structure. The OS recognises the structure and knows what to do when you double-click the icon.
That's all.
Installation means dragging the icon (mv'ing the directory) to your hard drive. Want different versions? Want to uninstall? Just get rid of the directory. No problem, just rename the old version.
Drag and drop isn't the point. The point here is that there is conceptual simplicity. No dumbing things down for the "average joe" because there is no need to. Less chance of anything going around that you'd need to find a Linux-savvy user to fix.
We should strive not to dumb things down, but to make things inherently easy to use!
You want ROX-Filer, http://rox.sourceforge.net/
See also Zero-Install http://zero-install.sourceforge.net/, a seperate but related/compatible idea that tries to simplify matters even further.
Agree with parent: this kind of packaging system makes Macs very pleasant to deal with. This doesn't solve all our problems, but it is something we should use for apps (openoffice, etc).
Could stand in front of these bridges and sign to each other, sign languages being more mutually intelligible than spoken languages.
In case anyone is arguing that this is simply useless fluff (which it might turn out to be, but for now, give it a fair shake), keep in mind how much your perspective might change if you actually had ENORMOUS number of files on your computer, let's say a couple of decades, each year massive in its own, and every so soften you do want to find that report Carl wrote somewhere back there in the 80s.
Sorry for the preaching, but please try changing your perspective when thinking about this.
Yes interesting! I've always been annoyed by how a file couldn't be in two places at the same time. I guess you could always use links and symlinks but that's just not as easy.
And don't complain about me wanting things to be easy. I'm mostly willing to learn how to use a good tool, but at some point, there needs to be some day to day whiziness, the technology needs to enable you at some point rather than holding you back. Ease isn't appealing for laziness's sake; ease is appealing because of how much bigger you find yourself thinking.
Incidentally, why is it not possible to hardlink a directory?
Theyre building a browser for programmers, not for end user
Am i misreading this?
Wasn't a browser for programmers (and people interested in testing) the whole POINT of the mozilla project? Keep on using Netscape K-Meleon Chimera Galeon Skipstone Konq, then; you'd still be helping the cause of making people write for standards and not for product X.
heh... funny... but i think the thing that was interesting about the article was that people who did lots of thumby things (mobile phones, games) also started using their thumbs for things that people normally use their index fingers for... no wait, maybe i'm misreading the article.
okay, catch breath... what WOULD make the article interesting is if these people were actually usinsg their thumbs in OTHER non-button-pushy activities that people normally use their fingers for.
aw hell, i'll shut up now
So... (NLP stuff aside) is this why secretaries will never become obsolete no matter how advanced technology gets? (this isn't entirely true, i guess, but then you step into AI land which isn't what i'm talking about)
Someone care to explain to me why one might see this as good thing? I tend to use these a bit
If you're also wanting to do something besides more of the same, you might also be interested in the WMX or WM2 window managers at (http://www.all-day-breakfast.com/wmx/ and
http://www.all-day-breakfast.com/wm2), and also the Lyx document processor (http://www.lyx.org), which has absolutely nothing to do with your request. Be careful, WMX is MUCH nicer when you edit the header files and strip out stuff like pixmap, and "New"
Anyone find that "wife" bit at the end at least moderately amusing? It was as if twingalaxies was trying to slip in a "really, you're not losers!" (no offense directed at the man who accomplished this feat of course)
Know if these things can handle hell-grasses like St. Augustine? Would be great if could use this in sunny Florida where lawnmowing in the summer and the fumes absolutely sucks. Not inhaling the stuff and having my mouth taste funny for the next hour would rock.
Erm, right, but we're talking a WHOLE different set of scale here. Not that i don't approve of GM foods, but there really are serious risks involved. I dunno, whassa good analogy? rm, vs rm -R?
okay, i feel stupid posting this (enter the obvious reply, "that's because you are") but i've always sorta felt that of all the diseases in the world, the common cold should be one of those that we really just shouldn't bother to cure For adults at least, it's just a nuiscance, a small suffering. Seems like something people in the cushy part of the world should learn to endure, some amount of minor suffering.
Curing the cold is one more step towards us growing soft and useless. Of course, there are plenty of good reasons for doing this (such as learning about curing stuff in general), but it's just a feeling.
Please forgive me as i make a stab at this.
Moral relativism is a weak way of compensating for a lack of information, but for a lot of people, it might just be the best way to go.
Fine, DON'T BE a moral relativist, say that there is a definite RIGHT and WRONG, but if you want to do that, make sure you have enough information. Of course, you can never really do that, but you can at least try.
That means live in China or X years, or at least study it at University with some rigour. Once you really know what you're talking about (mile in man's shoes, etc), then you have all the right in the world to condemn. Personally, i don't think CNN, a visit or two to China, or reports from Harry Wu are sufficient.
Otherwise, moral relativism, though it be weak, is the best you've got.
(only a first stab, please pick apart as neccesary)
I would like to make the humble proposal that people don't rail on The Evil Human Rights Thrashing Oppressors of China unless they ACTUALLY LIVED THERE for a significant amount of time.
Having touristed through or spent a a week, a month, is not enough. If you are a Chinese citizen, or you have lived in China for approximately three or more years, then fine, go ahead.
Otherwise, how much of what you see on CNN et. al do you really trust? Even journalists are susceptible to the danger of overreacting and seeing things through our cultural filters and expectations.
I'm not trying to defend the Chinese Govt. either. They have their problems, but so do we. All i'm begging for is comments from people who genuinely understand the situation. And no, i'm not one of them, which is why i'm sitting my ass as much on this fence as i can.
Tone the hysteria down. More Linux users is overall a GT, right?
Yes, to be able to "watch TV, surf the web, teleconference" is nice, and yes, taking a stance against colour can "set [us] up to be left behind,".
However, developing colour should not come at a sacrifice in further refining basic PDA features: affordability, portability, simplicity, display clarity.
Not that Palm's aren't wonderful as they are, but it'd be more interesting to see them perfect the core bits . Haven't seen one in a while, so maybe they have.
Who knows though, maybe a colour (as a means of encoding info) will keep me better organised. I'm just waiting my middle-class butt can easily afford one.
If this were inevitable, maybe it would be a good idea, as soon as we get the ability, to sample and record genetic information for a bunch of randomly chosen people, imperfections and all.
If in the further distant future, our children realise the mistake (if the were) made via genetic engineering, they could at least attempt to restore some the lost diversity?
If you do decide to switch, but want both layouts, i would recommend popping the caps off and writing the dvorak letters on the FRONT of the keys so you don't wear them out as quickly. It's also unobstrusive for the qwertietes that borrow your computer. Use whatever layout-switching advice you find to go with it.
/. posts, philosophy or english papers, and so forth. May not be faster, but it certainly FEELS more comfortable, more rhythmic, and more error-free. It also caused my non-typist friend to more easily learn how to type.
I use "aaa" (as in what the bloody hell?) to switch to qwerty, and "mmm" (as in mmm... forbiden donut) to switch to dvorak
Yes, coding can be a pain, but quickly got used to it, sucked it up for the benefit of writing emails,
Sorry, only anecdotal evidence from me.
Freedom on information, yeah, i understand why that's so important. But might note that China!=US, different circumstances and all. We see this as a tyrannical act of suppresion, but only from the comforts of our nice cozy, wealthy, stable lifestyle.
China will get there when it gets there, by its own means... hopefully